How voters hold the European People’s Party accountable in European Parliament elections

The Effect that Structural and Investment Funds have on Voter Behaviour in European Parliamentary Elections

“…Our second hypothesis is in accordance with works that were able to show a positive association between economic cycles and the vote (see Okolikj and Quinlan, 2016;Page, 2016). Thus we predict that there will be a traditional economic vote phenomenon in which there will be a positive correlation between incumbent governments and lower unemployment rates and higher GDP per capita levels in EP elections.…”

“…We are merely replicating many of these works by establishing that SIF disbursement will not be driven by objective economic indicators such as unemployment rate or GDP per capita, which then opens up the question of whether EP voters will reward incumbent parties for directing EU money to their region. Thus, our first hypothesis seeks to discount notions that SIFs are not politicized, and opens the discussion that incumbent parties may be expecting higher levels of voter support in EP elections in return for larger SIF disbursements.H1 SIFs will not be highly correlated to economic indicators such as unemployment rate or GDP per capita .Our second hypothesis is in accordance with works that were able to show a positive association between economic cycles and the vote (see Okolikj and Quinlan, ; Page, ). Thus we predict that there will be a traditional economic vote phenomenon in which there will be a positive correlation between incumbent governments and lower unemployment rates and higher GDP per capita levels in EP elections.H2 The incumbent party's vote share will be positively affected by economic indicators such as lower unemployment rates and higher GDP per capita levels .Our third, and most important, hypothesis considers the impact of SIF disbursement levels on the national incumbent EP vote share.…”

“…Previous work on EP elections and economic perceptions has found mixed results (see Bartkowska and Tiemann, 2015;Okolikj and Quinlan, 2016;Page, 2016;Tilley et al, 2008). In our analysis, however, we shift attention to SIFs as the EP economic voting determinant.…”

Is the EU held accountable for economic performances? Assessing vote and popularity functions before and after membership

“…As of now, empirical studies on EU accountability have mainly focused on EPE because it is the most direct channel of accountability (Tilley et al 2008 (Okolikj & Quinlan 2016). Most notably, Page (2016) has shown that satisfaction with the economy increases the likelihood of voting for the European People's Party when citizens believe that the EU is more responsible for the economic situation than national governments. This study thus confirms that EU responsibility plays an important role in the success of the EU incumbent in European elections.…”

“…Given such an assumption, we have to identify incumbent parties at the EU level. To do so, we first rely on past studies on EU accountability in EPEs (Okolikj & Quinlan 2016;Page 2016). These studies foster the role of the party of the President of the European Commission, which is also the majority party at the European Parliament, that is the EPP, in the management of the economic situation.…”